<Begin Segment 24>

AK: I have a question. I just wonder, because your mother's of that generation, like, did you speak to her in Japanese?

NG: No, no, no. She was English speaking. She's English, she's an English speaker. Her Japanese is not very good. I mean, she would not speak to Japanese people who are fluent in Japanese. She would be, she couldn't, she would feel... she could speak to them, but she would be a little embarrassed. And she did not read or write...

SY: In Japanese.

NG: Japanese, uh-uh. Even though she went to Japanese school and all that, she didn't. She could read at probably the simple kind, but when it's, some letter came from Japan, she would call somebody to make sure that it was, she was reading it correctly.

SY: Yeah. That's pretty amazing considering she came here when she was twenty, huh? So she --

NG: No, no, no, this is my mom.

SY: Oh, sorry.

NG: She was asking about my mom.

AK: That's right. Okay. Yeah, of course your mom spoke English.

SY: Yeah, your mom spoke English 'cause she was born here. Interesting.

NG: Yeah, that's, it's sad about when you don't 'cause there's never, I could never speak to my grandmother about really important things.

SY: She was complete, she was only Japanese speaking, didn't speak English?

NG: Right. And with my limited, just no...

SY: Even though you were very close. Now, did you stay, so you stayed close to your grandmother, especially after she...

NG: Because after, in 1955 when we came, as soon as we bought the house they lived with us the whole time. So she died, so my grandfather died in, let's see, Karen was born in 1969, so 1968 he died, and she died two thousand... forgot how long ago she died. I don't remember now.

SY: Yeah, she lived to be...

NG: Hundred and five.

AK: Wow.

NG: Yeah, so she, so...

SY: And she stayed with you for many years after your grandfather died.

NG: Right. Twenty years, she lived twenty years after -- he was eighty-two, when he died at eighty-two he said, everybody said, "Oh, he lived a good, long life." Well, that's not so long today, you know? And she lived twenty-three years more. And I loved having them there. It was, but I'm sure it was not, it was not easy for my mom. But my dad, my grandmother said to me my dad never, ever said anything that made her feel unwelcome there, but I think it's 'cause he never had, he never had family. And, but you know how mothers are, they say things to their kids, and so it probably was annoying. If my grandmother said, like my grandmother, as, when she got older she'd be sitting there and she wouldn't, I said, "What's wrong?" She says the food doesn't taste good. So I go to my mom, I said she said the food doesn't taste good, 'cause I'm like, "What are you making?" And then she goes, then she's like, "Go watch her. You go, go watch her later." And of course she's eat it, she's eaten it all up. [Laughs] So I know it's hard on my mom, right, 'cause you can't help it. But as a grandchild...

SY: You liked it.

NG: Yeah, she could do no wrong.

SY: And you, when, you had conversations with her, but she spoke Japanese, you spoke English?

NG: Uh-huh.

SY: And so, but you, I mean, what are the kinds of things you talked --

NG: Yeah, so for the fact that she said how poor she was. I could get little, but I really, can't really have a conversation. And then it's funny 'cause she, it didn't matter what she said. She had, I certainly would not live by what she told me to do. Like okay, she, first of all, I could never say, call my mother-in-law "Mother." I could not. And she would say, "You need to call her mother." I said, "She's not my mother. I cannot." [Laughs] I don't call her Mother. But then I, that was it. She, I would not, I just said that, and if she said it again I said okay, okay. I would never argue with her. And they have those, their ways, but it's like --

SY: Morals?

NG: Yeah, she, like my, like my husband was a fulltime dad. He changed diapers like, there was no question, and so one day we were there and he was changing diapers, and my grandmother was horrified that I should not have a man do that. And I said, "Oh, I think he likes it." [Laughs] But I would never try to change her ways.

SY: Yeah. But she certainly, she still held onto a lot of [inaudible] --

NG: But if it was my mom who said that I would argue with her, of course. [Laughs]

SY: That's interesting. [Laughs]

NG: Not my grandmother.

SY: How, yeah, especially because you knew her for such a long time. You didn't, she lived so long, so you...

NG: I mean, she really was not, I wouldn't have chosen her for, like, my social, active, you know. She would be very right wing. [Laughs]

SY: Right. But being that she lived with you too, that was, that was a way of getting to know her really well. So when you moved out... well, you never moved out, right? You just commuted to UCLA. Wait, you lived as a schoolgirl, then you started commuting, so you went back, living back home.

NG: I did.

SY: At home.

<End Segment 24> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.